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I would argue a step further and say that it's because Apple chose the wrong solution for an OOP language with C-compatibility. They could have invented a langu
by sdegutis 13y ago
I would argue a step further and say that it's because Apple chose the wrong solution for an OOP language with C-compatibility. They could have invented a language more like C# for NeXTSTEP, but they chose the route with easier C compatibility. Now they're paying the cost of taking that early shortcut.
- comex 13y agoIt goes both ways - they're still reaping the benefits of making it very easy to interface with low-level native code, too (plus sidestepping GC variability).
- Touche 13y agoThey still can. All of their competitors are constantly researching new languages but we never hear a peep of any of that from Apple. Presumably the design-driven culture prevents big projects like a new language from ever getting anywhere.
- sdegutis 13y agoThey're making pretty significant advances with Clang and LLVM and have pretty much caught up to GCC in performance and surpassed it in usability. So they're not doing nothing, for sure. But they're pouring all that effort into Objective-C, which will still has the inherent problem of C compatibility. Granted it's evolving (i.e @import), but it can only go so far without breaking compatibility completely like C# did.
- Moto7451 13y agoGiven the development timeframe for NeXTSTEP, I don't think that a managed language would have been a likely choice. Remember, this is when your average barn burner workstation came with a 33MHz 386 Class CPU and 4-8MB of memory. The NeXT Computer came with a 25MHz '030 and 8MB of memory.
- pjmlp 13y agoThey could, as Xerox PARC machines were not as powerful and offered: - Lisp OS - Smalltalk OS - Mesa/Cedar (a GC enabled systems programming)